America is still America!

01 Thursday Nov 2018

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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As we move towards the mid-term elections next week, I think of all the dark moments in our nation’s experience these past months; the Muslim ban, the Charlottesville violence and murder of a young woman, the national abandonment of Puerto Rico after its devastating hurricane, the separation of children at the border from their parents, the fixation on political refugees fleeing for their lives from Honduras and hoping for political asylum based on a well-founded fear of persecution should they return to their home country, the rise in anti-Semitism, the murder of eleven Jews at prayer in a Pittsburgh synagogue by a white anti-Semitic nationalist, the threatened pipe-bombings of many of our nation’s leaders and Democratic activists, the murder of two African Americans by a white nationalist, the relentless dog-whistling to racism and hate, the personal attack on political enemies and the media, and on and on.

And I think of all the lightas well, people from every ethnic, religious, and national background coming together in solidarity to affirm our common humanity.

As much as I worry about the direction of our country and the cowardice of too many political leaders in Washington to speak out morally against all the outrageous statements and actions by the President, I also take heart that so many good people are running for office at every level of city, state and national government and that our nation has an opportunity to make a correction in its path, to renew the checks and balances built into the Constitution, and release the better angels of our national character.

In the Babylonian Talmud (Shabbat 54b) it is written:

“Whoever can stop…the people of his/her city from sinning, but does not…is held responsible for the sins of the people of his/her city. If s/he can stop a whole world from sinning, and does not, he/she is held responsible for the sins of the whole world.”

Rabbi Abraham Heschel expressed the moral spirit of Judaism when he said that “some are guilty; all are responsible.”

We are responsible whether we’ve been critics of this government’s policies or not. That’s why it is so important on Tuesday that every adult American vote. Polls suggest historically that young people do not vote in mid-term elections. If you have a son or a daughter, a grandson or a granddaughter, a niece or nephew, cousin or friend, employee or colleague that is young – please tell them to vote next Tuesday and remind them that recent history has proven that elections can be  decided by only dozens of people.

I am hoping for a turnaround election and a resulting statement to the nation and world that America is still America, that the light of morality shines through in our political process!

 

Solidarity at the Westwood Federal Building

29 Monday Oct 2018

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti at Westwood Rally last evening

The violent speech, the praise of politicians who body slam journalists, the not so subtle dog-whistles that stir up racist hatred, Trumps’ appeal to white nationalism, his intolerance of people of color, his slander of those seeking political asylum because of their well-founded fear of persecution should they return to their nation of origin, his accusation that Middle East terrorists have inserted themselves into a wave of frightened women, children, and men refugees walking hundreds of miles to escape harm, his attack on the “other”, his calling every political critic “evil,” his attacking journalists as fake-news gatherers – all of it must stop and we must be the agents of change to stop it.

We American Jews thought we were safe from violence, but we now know if we didn’t before that the Jewish people remain the eternal scapegoats for haters because we affirm that every human being is created b’tzelem Elohim and is imbued with infinite value and worth.

We Jews have become the targets yet again of the haters’ projected venom and rage. Old world anti-Semitism showed its ugly head at Shabbat morning services in Pittsburgh and we mourn the loss of eleven Jews who wanted nothing other than to pray in peace and celebrate Shabbat.

As every speaker last night at the Westwood Federal Building Rally noted including Mayor Garcetti, all of us are in the same boat, America’s strength is our diversity, and Muslim, Christian, Jew, Latino, Black, women, men, and children are brothers and sisters. We may pray out of our respective religious traditions, but we’re all Americans.

It’s time to assert ourselves as we’ve not felt we’ve had to do before, to use the power of the vote on November 6 and take back the US government from those politicians who refuse to exercise moral courage and stand up to Trump and his minions.

It’s time to return decency to our nation and integrity to our democratic processes and institutions, to say no to voter suppression, and to support those candidates who will restore checks and balances that define our constitutional democracy.

The following analysis by Marty Kaplan in the Forward connects the dots between Donald Trump’s relentless tweets and rhetoric and the Pittsburgh atrocity –

“The Straight Line From 5,000 Trump Lies To 11 Jews Murdered In Pittsburgh” – By Marty Kaplan October 27, 2018 – the Forward –

Go to – https://bit.ly/2PuTenJ

 

 

 

Letter from Temple Israel Leadership on the tragic events in Pittsburgh Shabbat morning

28 Sunday Oct 2018

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Jewish History, Jewish Identity

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Our hearts break at the murders of eleven worshippers at Shabbat services at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh and of the shooting of the police sent to protect them this morning. We express our horror and grief at this hate-filled act that strikes at the heart of our American tradition of compassion and respect for the dignity of every human being.

The killer used the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) that historically has reached out to immigrants and settled refugees in the United States as his foil for his anti-Semitic outrage, the worst attack on Jews in American Jewish history, but we express our pride in the good work that HIAS has done over the past century in fulfilling Emma Lazarus’s expression of our national commitment to welcome the tempest tossed to our country.

We want to assure our community that we have tightened security and had the LAPD in addition to our own security with us this morning at services. Our first obligation is to the safety and security of our community.

Recent events in our country have challenged our democratic values and institutions and our nation as a force of love and goodness in the world. Our community at Temple Israel is committed to combatting this destructive negativity and indecency. Please know that all of us are here for you as a source of comfort and moral support.

We will convene together at 9:30 am tomorrow at Temple Israel for prayer and solidarity if you would like to join us.

We send our condolences to the families of the victims and hopes for the complete healing of those injured.

May the souls of those lost today be bound up in the bonds of eternal life.

Signed,

Senior Staff of Temple Israel of Hollywood and our Board President

 

The Big Lie

26 Friday Oct 2018

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Quote of the Day

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“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.” Adolf Hitler

“The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly – it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.” Joseph Goebbels

“Naturally the common people don’t want war. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament or a communist dictatorship. All you have to do is to tell them that they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger, It works the same in any country.” Hermann Goering

“See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda.” George W. Bush

“Lies can run a mile before the truth gets its track shoes on.” Reverend Al Sharpton’s mother

“If you wish to establish a lie, mix a little truth with it.” Zohar, Numbers 161a

“Even a lie is a psychic fact.” Carl Jung

 

“As ever, Watson – You see but you do not observe!”

25 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Social Justice

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This week’s Torah portion Vayera reminds me of Sherlock Holmes’ famous line: “As ever, Watson – you see but you do not observe!”

Most of us are like Watson. At first sight, we see the surface of things, a person or object’s size, shape, color, line, texture, and form.

Jewish mysticism teaches, however, that nothing is as it appears – every physical thing is a reflection of something deeper, more complex, wondrous, and enriched than we imagine.

Jacob Neusner, the scholar of early rabbinic Judaism, understood this when he described the Mishnah, the 2nd century strictly rational and ordered law code, as an ideal spiritual architecture underpinning the physical world. Every letter, word, phrase, and law, he said, is a reflection of the seen and the unseen, the explicit and implicit.

This week’s Torah portion, Vayera, is about that kind of seeing. It embraces especially what God sees and what God wants us to see and then emulate; the physical and metaphysical, the material and intuitive, the moral and ethical underpinnings in the world.

The three-letter Hebrew root of the parashah’s title Vayera (“And God appeared…”) is resh-aleph-heh. This Hebrew root appears eleven times in a variety of forms (Genesis 18:1-22:24). In nine of the eleven, the root is used in connection with God and angels.

Abraham greets three God-like humans who ‘appear’ near his tent.

God goes to Sodom and ‘sees’ whether the people have turned from their evil.

Lot ‘saw’ two of God’s messengers.

Sarah ‘saw’ Hagar’s son Ishmael and feared he would receive the inheritance in place of her son Isaac.

Hagar ‘saw’ a well of water that would save her son Ishmael from dehydration and death.

Abraham and Isaac ‘saw’ the cloud hovering over a mountain called Moriah, the place where there would be both divine and human ‘vision.’

In nine of the eleven occurrences, there’s divine revelation. These chapters in Genesis point to our patriarch Abraham as the grand ‘seer’ of his generation.

In every one of these spiritual encounters, we sense a spiritual awakening. When the heart opens in this way and the soul ‘sees,’ we’re drawn more deeply into what being human means and what God requires of us, “To do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with Your God.” (Micah 6:8)

What does Abraham see and do? The answer is the central moral message in this Torah portion and sets the stage for Jewish moral activism from that point forward.

Abraham circumcised himself and while recovering in pain he saw the three strangers approach. He got up and ran to welcome them despite his personal discomfort in an act of selfless hospitality.

Tradition understands these three men as angels sent for a three specific purposes. The first was to comfort Abraham as he recovered from circumcision. The second was to tell Abraham that God was about to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. And the third informed Abraham that in her old age his wife Sarah would give birth to a child that would carry forward the family line.

Abraham is regarded as the first Jew not only because he sensed God’s unity and responded to God’s call, but because he personified the morality of the three angels’ mission.

He welcomed strangers into his tent with chesed (loving-kindness).

Upon learning that the two cities of Sodom and Gomorrah would be destroyed, he challenged God to behave according to God’s own divine standards of justice and save the innocent.

The story enumerates values that run through Jewish tradition; to welcome strangers, to care for the sick, to raise up the next generation, and to fight for justice.

Though Vayera is particular to Jews, its message is universal.

Shabbat Shalom.

 

 

 

Weeping and alone in a field

24 Wednesday Oct 2018

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Israel and Palestine, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry, Stories

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Chayei Sarah is a monumental Torah portion in the Book of Genesis (23:1-25:18) that establishes Hebron as one of our people’s holiest cities in the land of Israel.

The sidra begins by telling the story of Abraham buying burial space in the Cave of Machpelah for his wife Sarah. That site would become holy to Judaism and Islam through the generations, and the city of Hebron, which is overwhelmingly Arab with a small enclave of right-wing Jewish religious extremist settlers, is a hot spot between Israel and the Palestinians today.

The parashah also tells the moving story of Isaac’s and Rebekah’s meeting, betrothal and marriage arranged by Abraham through his servant Eliezer who his master sent to find a wife for his son Isaac.

For the first time in Jewish history we witness the passing of the baton of inheritance and leadership from one generation to the next.

I offer here a poetic Midrash on Isaac’s and Rebekah’s encounter leading to their marriage. It is based loosely on the Torah story as amplified by rabbinic Midrash and is a revisiting of a poem I wrote a few years ago and posted on this blog.

I love this story because Isaac’s and Rebecca’s meeting is simple and sweet. It offers a the hope of what’s possible between individuals and tribes that make up the Jewish people today and the peoples of the Middle East who suffer too much polarization, suspicion, distrust, and hatred of each other.

Imagine the scene – Isaac is alone meditating in an open field and Rebecca and Abraham’s servant Eliezer approach from afar in a camel caravan. I shift voices in the poem between Isaac, Rebekah and Eliezer. I begin with Isaac:

“To be alone amidst shifting wheat and rock, / Beneath the sun and stirred-up clouds / Hearing singing angels audible in the wind.

I’ve secluded myself as my father did / When he went out alone leaving all he knew / For a place he’d never been that God would show him.

I can do nothing else / Because Father broke my heart and crushed my soul / When he betrayed me by nearly offering me to his God / Stealing me away one morning before my mother Sarah awoke.

When my mother learned her soul passed from the world./ O how she loved me! / And filled me up with laughter, love and tears. / Bereft now I’m desolate in this field.

Compassionate One – / Do You hear me from this arid place / Filled with snakes and beasts, / Polluted by hatred and vengeance?”

As if in response from afar / A caravan appears of people and camels, / Led by Eliezer, Abraham’s servant, / With a young girl.

Isaac, burdened in grief neither looks nor sees. / He sits still lasuach basadeh / Meditating and weeping / Beneath the afternoon sun / And swirling clouds / And singing angels / Whom he cannot hear.

Rebekah asks: / “Who is that man crying alone in the field?” / Eliezer says: / “He is my master Isaac, your intended one, / Whose seed you will carry and make the future.”

“Vatipol min hagamal – And she fell from her camel” / Shocked and afraid onto the hard ground.

She veiled her face and bowed her head. / And Rebekah and Isaac entered Sarah’s tent, / And Rebekah comforted him.”

Poem by Rabbi John L. Rosove based on traditional Midrashim

 

 

Living patiently until November 6

23 Tuesday Oct 2018

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Social Justice, Tributes, Women's Rights

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For the past two years I have experienced, like so many of us, wide mood swings taking me from righteous indignation, disgust and outrage on one side to patience, perseverance and suffering on the other.

As we approach the mid-term elections on November 6, both extremes have filled me up.

On Sunday this past week, my family and I attended a 2000-person packed auditorium at the Culver City High School to hear Pete Souza, the personal photographer of President Obama (he is promoting a new book of photographs of the President called “Shade – A Tale of Two Presidents”). Most everyone in the hall was supportive and relived with sweet nostalgia, joy and longing the eight years of the Obama presidency.

Pete took us down memory lane and showed us many of his memorable candid photos of Obama (he took 1.9 million photographs during Obama’s eight-year term). Taken all together these photos reveal the humanity, grace, intellect, vision, thoughtful and considered brilliance of the 44th President.

Pete contrasted the current occupant of the White House with the man he respects and loves so deeply. Not once, as I can recall, did Pete mention the name of the current White House occupant – he referred to him several times as “that guy.” Only in hindsight did it occur to me that his not saying the President’s name was deliberate, that should he have done so would have dirtied his speech.

As November 6 approaches I have been remarkably impatient, short-tempered and excruciatingly worried. I don’t know the outcome to this crucial mid-term election, whether the Democrats will take back the House of Representatives or not (I don’t expect the Senate to change hands). No one knows what will happen and where we’ll be on November 7.

President Obama was right yesterday when he said to a crowd in Nevada as he campaigned that this is the most important election in our lifetime because it will determine the state of our democracy going forward at least over the next two years. All we can do is to be certain that everyone we know votes, especially in swing House districts and purple states.

Rainer Maria Rilke, the Bohemian-Austrian poet and novelist (1875-1926), offered the following wisdom about living patiently:

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

I hope that on November 7 we will live the answer so many of us yearn to know.

How Abraham healed God

19 Friday Oct 2018

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Jewish History, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life

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The greatest Jewish theological revolution since the destruction of the Temple (70 CE) was brought about by Kabbalah. The greatest new idea about the relationship between God and humankind during the past 2000 years was introduced by Jewish mystics who boldly asserted that we humans have the ability to restore God’s wholeness and effect the end of God’s exile within the Divine Self.

Much of this new thinking was stimulated by Rabbi Isaac Luria (15th century, Safed) whose ideas about the origins of the universe led to the belief that the Jewish people has the capacity to create the conditions necessary for the coming of the Messiah.

Isaac Luria’s cosmology is powerfully innovative. He explains that when God contemplated creating the universe the Creator realized that there was no room for anything except God’s Self, Who filled time and space.

To accommodate the new creation God underwent contraction (tzimtzum). Before the beginning God was light, and so God took away some of the light and placed it in giant vessels (keilim), but the vessels were not strong enough to contain the light and an explosion shattered the vessels (sh’virat ha-keilim) flinging the shards (kelipot) to the four corners of the universe. Trapped in the shards were sparks (n’tzitzot). Whenever a Jew performs a mitzvah (commandment), a spark is released from a shard. When all Jews perform all the mitzvot all the sparks are released, the Messiah is ‘awakened,’ and Tikun Olam (restoration/repair of the world) results. When this occurs God too undergoes Tikun and the holiest Name (YHVH or Yod–Heh–Vav–Heh) is reunified.

Jewish mystics explain that the Yod–Heh (the first two letters of the 4-letter Name) represents the “highest” and purest of God’s ten emanations (Sefirot), but were separated from the Vav–Heh (the third and fourth letters of the holy Name) when the vessels shattered. The Vav-Heh represents the “lower” Divine Sefirot. As such, the “upper” and “lower” worlds were split apart mirroring the brokenness of our own world.

Enter Abraham, who in this week’s Parashat Lech L’cha (Genesis 12:1-17:27) receives the Divine call. That call and Abraham’s receptive response was a necessary stage leading to the unification (Yihud) of God’s holiest 4-letter Name. How so?

In Genesis 12:2 we read of God’s promise to Avram :

“I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and You shall be a blessing (Veh’yeh b’rachah).”

Note that God’s 4-letter Name (Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh) is comprised of the same 4 letters as Veh’yeh (“…and be a blessing”), but appear in a different order (Vav-Heh-Yod-Heh).

Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev (1740-1809, Ukraine), teaching that nothing is to be overlooked in Torah and  every word and letter have deeper metaphysical significance wrote:

“The letter Yod-Heh [the ‘higher’ Divine emanations] in the word Veh’yeh is an allusion to God, whereas the letters Vav-heh [the ‘lower’ Divine emanations] is an allusion to the Jewish people. As long as Abraham had not existed, there had not been a human being who tried to ‘awaken’ God’s largess to be dispensed in the lower regions. God’s largess, whenever the Eternal One dispensed it for the good of humankind, owed this exclusively to the Creator’s goodwill [i.e. meritless Grace]. As soon as Abraham became active on earth, there were deeds on earth that ‘awakened’ God to dispense the Divine largess as a result of acts performed by human beings. In other words, prior to Abraham, God’s Name could be spelled in the order Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh, whereas this order had now been reversed and God’s Name could be spelled as Vav-Heh-Yod-Heh… The reversal of the sequence of the letters Vav-Heh hints at this largess having its origin in the ‘lower,’ rather than the celestial regions.” (Kedushat Levi, translation and commentary by Rabbi Eliahu Monk, Lambda Press, volume 1, pages 43-44)

What is the meaning of this complicated understanding of the 4 letters in God’s Name? Until Abram appeared, Levi Yitzhak taught, there was no mutual relationship between God and humankind. However, with Abram all that changed. Abram’s capacity to “hear” God’s call (i.e. prophesy) and respond augured well not only for the future spiritual development of the Jewish people but signaled the beginning of Divine Tikun.

The Torah’s reversing the order of the letters represents Abram reversing the direction of largess that had exclusively come from God to humankind to a new paradigm that moved from humankind to God.

The idea that Jews can affect the internal life of God is revolutionary, not only in Judaism but in the history of religion. This is why, according to Jewish mystics, Abram was the world’s first Jew. As a Jew, each of us carries a burden, responsibility and opportunity to work towards tikun olam, the restoration/repair of a shattered universe. When that occurs so too is there a Tikun Shem M’forash (a restoration of God’s holiest 4-letter Name).

Shabbat Shalom.